The Washoe County School District board of trustees is addressing a potential violation of the Nevada open meeting law stemming from an op-ed submitted to the Reno Gazette Journal by one of its members.

The op-ed, written by trustee Scott Kelley on behalf of the board, was apologizing to the community for how the board handled Superintendent Traci Davis’ job performance review.

Kelley solicited input on the piece in emails and phone calls to his colleagues on the board prior to its submission, publishing only after a “majority” of trustees had given their approval. This, says board vice president Katy Simon Holland, is where the potential open meeting law violation lies.

“His intention was as a courtesy to let board members know,” Holland said. “Unfortunately, it went over that fine line.”

That fine line Holland is referring to is the difference between board members informally discussing matters among themselves and formally polling a majority of trustees, something that could constitute board action.

Nevada open meeting law requires public bodies like the school board to notify the public three working days before taking any collective action, including issuing a written agenda of what they plan to talk about as a body. Violations are investigated by the Nevada Attorney General's Office and can result in penalties for public officials.

Simply asking board members for input on the op-ed is not the issue. The issue is that Kelley decided to send the piece only after he’d gotten a "majority" of trustees to approve of what he'd written, Kelley said.

This could be construed as an official action of the board, he said.

“We don’t think it’s an open meeting law violation, but we’re going to go ahead and take care of it,” he said in an interview with the RGJ.

'Unreasonably reasonable when it comes to transparency'

Board president Angela Taylor said she was the one who sounded the alarm of the potential violation. After Kelley sent the email saying a “majority” of trustees had approved the op-ed, she got in touch with the board’s attorney to see if a line had been crossed.

“We want to be unreasonably reasonable when it comes to transparency,” Taylor said.

The board will discuss the potential violation during its meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 28. Nevada law gives a 30-day window for public bodies to address and “cure” potential open meeting law violations before state sanctions would be handed down.

The potential violation happened on November 4 or November 5, according to Tuesday's meeting agenda item addressing the potential violation.

The trustees fix for this potential violation would be to place all the email correspondence leading up to the op-ed onto the public record and publicly vote to accept or deny Kelley's editorial.

By rectifying the error now, the trustees could avoid a member of the public filing an open meeting law complaint with the attorney general's office, which would trigger a possible investigation.

School board has violated the open meeting law before

WCSD’s board of trustees has a recent history of open meeting law violations.

In July 2014, the board took action behind closed doors to fire then-Superintendent Pedro Martinez, resulting in a total of six open meeting law violations.

The Attorney General’s Office fined six trustees $250 for each violation totaling to a $1,500 fine.

Martinez sued the board, but the lawsuit was settled out of court for about $500,000.

The board got itself into similar hot water during an impromptu vote to hire current Superintendent Traci Davis.

Trustees originally hired Davis during a board meeting in 2015 with no mention on the meeting’s agenda aside from a reference to a discussion about the superintendent search.

Trustees quickly rescinded the vote after an RGJ reporter questioned if the hire was contrary to open meeting law.

Read the emails where the potential open meeting law violation occurred:

The email in question was sent by Scott Kelley to Angela Taylor on Saturday, Nov. 4.

"Hi Angie, I received feedback and the go-ahead from you, Katy, John and Veronica," the email reads. "I would liked to have heard from Debra and Malena, but since a majority responded, and since I wanted to get it in for Sunday's paper, I went ahead and submitted. Thanks for your help!"

Emails from RGJ engagement editor Brett McGinness and K-12 education reporter Sam Gross are also included in the thread. Kelley had reached out for McGinness's email address and to submit the op-ed.